Bluffton Town Council expected to vote tonight on partnership for bringing business to Buckwalter Place

Bluffton Town Council will hold a closed meeting tonight and is expected to vote afterward on whether or not it will spend about $1 million to help reel in an undisclosed business to Buckwalter Place.

The meeting begins at 6 p.m. at Town Hall, 20 Bridge Street.

If the town approves spending the money, it will complete a three-way partnership between the town, the Bluffton Public Development Corporation and Beaufort County.

Together, the groups would likely spend about $1 million each to buy about 34 acres of undeveloped property at the multi-purpose commercial development park off Buckwalter Parkway, development corporation chairman Roberts Vaux said.

Of that land, 10 to 12 acres are being marketed to one particular business the corporation has been attempting to entice to locate to Bluffton for the past eight months, Vaux has said. Officials have declined to name the business or disclose what industry it’s in due to ongoing negotiations.

Under the agreement, the three groups would form some sort of entity — perhaps a corporation — that would purchase the property from Buckwalter Place developers, Buckwalter Commercial LLC, Vaux said. They would then negotiate a deal to bring in the business.

Beaufort County Council voted on Feb. 25 to authorize county administrator Gary Kubic to spend as much as $1 million from the county’s general reserve fund for the county’s share.

It's uncertain where the town's share would come from.

Vaux said after County Council's vote that the sale would be completed sometime this month, after which the corporation, town and county would have 90 days to address any issues through discussions and public hearings and finalize payment plans, as outlined in the purchase agreement.

Check back at blufftontoday.com later tonight for coverage of the vote.

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The only "partnership" our elected officials should be concerned with is it's partnership with we the people, their constituents, in otherwords......the taxpayers that pay their bills!
Not telling us what business they wish to spend all of this money on is outrageous.

And then we have Gary Kubic willing to pull a million dollars out of our reserved fund to put towards a business they refuse to tell us taxpayers about.
This is the same, revenue greedy, Gary Kubic who wants to increase our reserve fund so he has more money to tap into for his pet projects, such as this.

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